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Creative Wave aims to empower young artists

Photographer Kelly Crawford, one of three artists who will be featured at Creative Wave, poses with her animals.

Kelly Crawford works on a new piece of art.

Art and commerce will attempt to get along March 9 at Anchor Boutique for the first-ever Creative Wave, an event to showcase young artists' work while helping to propel their ambitions.

Artists featured at the event include painter Hahau Yisrael, photographer Kelly Crawford and event creator Lindsey Williams, who will be showing her mixed media pieces.

Williams sees the event as an opportunity for young artists to connect and learn how to market their work in order to make sustainable livings as working artists.

She hopes the evening — part art exhibit, part symposium and part cocktail party — will give the featured artists a chance to present their work to the public while comparing resources and outlets with each other.

As a visual artist herself, Williams is familiar with the difficulties confronting young creative professionals.

“I had to give up on art for a number of years,” Williams said. “[It’s a] tough market to really be viable.”

Williams graduated from Flagler College in 2008 with a degree in graphic design and now lives in Washington, D.C., where she works as a freelance writer and marketing manager for Flavor Magazine.

Crawford, a 2008 graduate of the University of Central Florida’s photography program, has shown her work numerous times as a student and in small shows around St. Augustine, but she says Creative Wave is the most publicized event she’s been involved with.

For her, the amount of attention the event has been receiving is “kind of nerve-wracking," she said. "… But it’s also really awesome because you work really hard [as an artist]. It’s a big deal.”

Crawford sees the costs of materials and difficulty in locating a place to work as prohibitive for a lot of photographers.

“There are so many things working against you sitting down and making something,” she said. “If you’re not selling anything, it gets totally expensive.”

Still, she believes the largest hurdle facing young artists isn't funding, but instead the lack of critical and material support young artists face after completing college art degrees.

“You’re in school and you’re so used to having this constant dialogue and making things and having them critiqued — an environment which fosters creativity. And when you get out, there’s only a small group of people [who are] able to continue that work,” Crawford said.

Creative Wave aims to remedy that post-graduation isolation by bringing together artists who may not travel in the same circles in order to create a support network.

Another way the event is helping young artists is through its Creative Wave Dream Bank. A portion of the evening’s sales from artwork will go to a senior art student at Flagler College — who will be announced during the event — in order to help encourage his or her professional career as an artist after graduation.

In the future, Williams hopes to bring Creative Wave to other towns central for colleges and artists. She’s planning the organization’s next event for this summer in Richmond, Va. Other tentative cities include Washington, D.C., San Francisco, Seattle, San Diego and Savannah, Ga.

“There are just so many amazing, talented artists,” Williams said. “They’re sitting on gold. They just don’t know how to get it out there.”

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Creative Wave runs from 7 to 10 p.m. and will have food, drinks and music. Entrance is free, but Williams urges visitors to bring cash to purchase original works from the participating artists.

Anchor Boutique is at 210 St. George St., C2, in downtown St. Augustine. For more information about Creative Wave, go to the event's Facebook page here.